Who's more talented: Edgard Varèse, or Billy Joel?

[Rabrrrrrr]

Poll question: Who's more talented: Edgard Varèse, or Billy Joel?

An artist is never ahead of his time but most people are far behind theirs.

Everyone is born with genius, but most people only keep it a few minutes.

Or

I love you just the way you are

you you you had to be a bigshot

You may be right I may be crazy. But it just may be a lunatic you're looking for.

[maxsolomon]

1. There is more soul in one bar of Octandre

than in the entire Joel catalogue.

and i'm including his classical works.

[Rabrrrrrr]

2. Well said!

But then, I really did set up a totally unfair contest.

I was just in a Billy Joel hating mood.

[Rabrrrrrr]

3. Hmmm... someone voted for Billy, but didn't have the cajones to comment

[Shell Beau]

8. I voted for Billy. One, because I don't know the other one and Two,

becuase I like Billy and am not afraid to admit it!! :P

[Rabrrrrrr]

11. Then hie thyself to a record store, and pick up some Varese!

[Zomby Woof]

4. The present day composer refuses to die

Deserts, baby.

[Rabrrrrrr]

6. Yes, good stuff!

And don't forget Ionization! One of my favorites.

[sendero]

5. Billy Joel..

... has written some damn fine songs. On the other hand, Mr. Varese was the progenitor of a whole new way to view music.

As a fan of electronica, noise, art-tock, drum&bass, drill&bass and everything experimental whether it works or not, I have to go with EV :)

[Squeech]

7. Is this a trick question?

Somewhat off topic, but I hope you'll be amused anyway: one of the British modern music magazines (Mojo?) did a story on Stockhausen, as part of which they sat him down and played him some Moby and Aphex Twin stuff. He said pretty much the same thing about all of it: some nice textures, but way too much repetition. Then they played "Gesang der Junglinge" for Moby and whatsizname James from Aphex Twin, and they both said: cool sounds, but ol' Karlheinz should lighten up and allow himself to get into a groove!

So what I'm getting at here is that a style of music making based on the most rigorous application of sonic concepts is not going to have too much in common with music based on popular songcraft as practiced in American barrooms.

But that said, if I were ever disposed to make such a comparison, Billy Joel is not the exemplar of popular songcraft that would come to mind. Stack Brian Wilson up against Varese, I don't know how I'd vote :shrug:

[Rabrrrrrr]

10. That's a good insight -

We do have differeing musical tastes and needs. I'm not big on music that "grooves" - whether it be pop music, or even serious stuff like Robert Shaw's or Robert DeCormier's arrangements of hymn tunes and folk music. It's very much "songy".

I like music that is through-composed, like Varese, Stockhausen, and also incudintg the minimalists like Glass and Reich, in which there might be reptition, but it's always a modified repetition, not rote exact repitition like Mozart or Moby.

And I have no idea why, it's just the way it is. And neither one is necessarily wrong or right, or better or worse than the other. I'm just not built to listen to "songs".

[Squeech]

12. Moreover

repetition defines form, together with harmonic resolution, in most musics.

There's a practical reason why modern music (other than minimalism) doesn't need as much repetition as older stuff: we have recording technology. Composers before the 20th century had to figure out how to emphasize the important features of their scores to audiences that probably weren't going to hear the pieces more than once or twice a year. (Unless they had open rehearsals.) I assume this was the rationale for sonata form: here's my theme, here it is again, here's a contrasting theme, now I show off how clever I am by morphing the two themes in various ways, and finally, now that you've forgotten how the original themes went, here they are again! Obviously that's not how Varese works.

To my knowledge, the first composer to talk about the gramophone as an influence was Stravinsky, and not coincidentally, he was one of the most adventurous in terms of how much he would allow himself to get away with in any given score. (You know he's Zappa's second favorite composer, right?) And of course Varese was waiting impatiently for a variety of recording technology that would allow him to shape and structure raw sounds to his own designs, and when he finally got access to a tape recorder, "Deserts" followed in short order.

Did Debussy have access to the gramophone? "La Mer" is almost unthinkable otherwise.

[cemaphonic]

14. That's an interesting notion.

I think some of it was the interest in Program Music, where music was approached as largely a narrative form.

Also, keep in mind that serialism, one of the most fertile concepts in 20th cent. music, is heavily based on repetition, but since the rhythmic, harmonic, and melodic elements decoupled (at least as far as tonal analysis is concerned) the repetition is very hard for most people to pick up on.

[Squeech]

16. Hmmm...

I understand about the series, but I don't think "repetition" is the right word. The rules of course state that you don't come back to any pitch class until you've played the other eleven, but the art in it includes the idea that you don't just roll out the exact same row-- you transpose, you invert, you retrograde, or any combination. How I gather you're supposed to apprehend this stuff is to learn to perceive each unravelling of the series (in its various manifestations) as a complete event, an ictus.

Steve Reich tells a story about when he was a music student, learning serial technique from (I think it was) Luciano Berio. And Reich just did roll out the exact same row, because he was interested primarily in how the patterns played out, not in how he could make twelve-tone harmony work. And Berio (or whoever it was) looked over Reich's score and said, "If you want to write tonal music, why don't you just write tonal music!" Reich tells this as a vindication of the idea he was evolving, which became Soho minimalism as we know and love it today, but the flip side of it is that *repeating* the row is exactly what you're not supposed to do-- at least that's my understanding.

[ET Awful]

9. Who the hell is this Billy Joel guy you speak of?

:P

[longship]

13. Zappa's inspiration

Edgard Verese was Zappa's favorite. Frank drew a lot of ideas from him.
Good stuff.

[tonekat]

17. I got to see Zappa host an evening of Varese's music once

In NYC, I think at the old Academy of Music. A competent ensemble played the pieces. It was marred by some idiots who thought Zappa was going to play some of his stuff, but at least they shut up during the performance.

[Rabrrrrrr]

21. WOW! That would have been totally, rockin' cool!!

Wish I could have been there.

Did Frank conduct any of it?

[leftofthedial]

15. it's hard to imagine someone less talented than Billy Joel

[Rabrrrrrr]

20. I couldn't have said it better myself.

:thumbsup:

[LisaM]

18. I don't know who the other guy is but he has to be better than Billy Joel

Maybe, for instance, he can sing on key?

[Rabrrrrrr]

19. I'm glad to see Edgard taking such a big lead!

YAY!

There is some hope for America, at least amongst the more intellectual (that is, liberal/smart) ones.

[evlbstrd]

22. Varése being dead and Joel alive...

makes not one whit of difference. Varése in a landslide.